Preparation and characterization of semi-carbonized rice straw fiber

The semi-carbonization method is a kind of waste treatment to carbonize rice straw fiber at low semi-carbon temperature. The rice straw fiber is carbonized incompletely, which serves as building materials additive. The results reveal that the optimized carbonization condition is at 313 °C for 20-40 min with H3PO4 as activator. The structure of semi-carbonized straw fiber displays a large quantity of micropores, with which the wall thickness and the pore diameter are in the range of 1-4 μm, presenting the iodine sorption value of 1 320-1 470 mL/g and the methylene blue sorption value of 1 330-1 460 mg/g, respectively. Moreover, the acidic oxygen-containing groups impart the structure higher sorption of polar molecules. The semi-carbonized rice straw fiber with open and closed micro-mesopores demonstrates good hygroscopicity, implying the potential application as a functional additive in building materials.